Hawaii Five-O - 2 - Terror in the Sun

by Michael Avallone

  May nodded, never having to be told anything twice. One of her prime assets as Five-O’s all-weather, all-purpose secretary. She jerked her head at the closed door of Tornier’s room.

  “Get anything out of that monster?”

  “Enough. He’s part of a unit and so far we have stopped two of them. I don’t know how many more are involved. If anything comes up, you can reach me at the Governor’s office. I should be there for most of the next hour. Got that?”

  “Got it.”

  He touched her under the chin, turned and walked down the hall. May watched him going, and then sighed. McGarrett was a very easy man to like. A difficult one to love. She knew of no man in the world who thought so much of his job. His duty. May had sensed from the very beginning that any woman in McGarrett’s life would run second to his profession.

  Pushing the thought from her mind, she smiled and hurried to the elevators to go up to see Danny Williams and Chin Ho Kelly. Thank God they were still alive and not dead—

  Still able to see the Honolulu sunlight and smell the pretty flowers. Aloha, oe!

  The Governor was in his office. McGarrett had wasted only twenty minutes of his own valuable time in reaching the building. When he was ushered into the private sanctum, he got right down to cases. The Governor looked tired, he saw that, but he also noticed that the man’s clean-cut, handsome appearance would never suffer for it. Some men have that quality. The Governor’s elemental signs of fatigue only heightened the effect of his bearing and manner. He was the most impressive public official that McGarrett had ever known.

  “How’s Mr. Endore this morning?” the Governor got right down to cases. He gestured McGarrett to a chair but was waved off. McGarrett was one to stand on his feet when he had a lot of talking to do. Or something to sell. The Governor recognized all the signs. He masked a smile. Behind his chair, the new Oahuan morning was misty and full-blooded. Rain was imminent, despite the shining sun and the clear skies. Darkish clouds were scudding in from beyond the peaked tops of the volcanic islands.

  “Alive, if that’s what you mean, Governor.”

  “All right, McGarrett. Let’s have it. All of it.”

  “From the top?”

  “Very well. But spare me our little interview in Pearl Harbor yesterday morning. I want specifics. You can give me your conclusions later.” The Governor thumbed his intercom on, spoke tersely into it and then flicked it off. He sat back in his polished swivel chair and touched the tips of all his fingers together. “We won’t be disturbed. I can give you about fifteen minutes. Shoot.”

  “You know about Williams and Kelly and the car crash?”

  “Yes. And I am sorry. You know that.”

  “And last night—the rumble at my office? We have a Frenchman with no markings cooling his heels under guard at Honolulu General.”

  “The Battle Of Five-O?” The Governor shook his head. “That Pier Six brawl is all over town. You look in fine shape but they say you practically took an arm off a man.”

  “All right,” McGarrett said. “Did you hear about the state trooper who fired his gun at a man who resisted arrest out at one of those hotels of questionable nature? The man literally blew up. The M.E. at the County Morgue said that only nitro or something highly explosive could do that.”

  “Yes. Captain Nakama sent me the report. It’s on my desk. He knows how I want to keep tabs on unusual occurrences while we have our famous guest on our doorstep. Go on.”

  “Last but not least,” McGarrett said slowly, “did you know that Mr. Endore was nearly strangled to death last night by an unknown intruder after you dropped him off? Or has the English bird kept that to himself this fine, sunny morning, too?”

  The Governor’s face crinkled and then opened in amazement. He rocked forward in his chair. His voice, low and almost guarded despite their seclusion from prying eyes and potential eavesdroppers, was nearly a whisper.

  “How do you know that, McGarrett?”

  “I was there. With Carraway, that watchdog of his. Someone made it in from the terrace, started to strangle him and Carraway and I broke it up. The man got away. Damnedest trick you ever saw. As if he walked up the face of the building. Or down.”

  “McGarrett, I want to know everything that happened last night. In detail. And what were you doing at the Kahala at that unlikely hour? Did you have a lead—?”

  So McGarrett told him, including all the important details, leaving out only the sweetest and least connected piece of information. His shackup with the Diplomat’s lovely, redheaded daughter.

  When he was done, the Governor had all he could do to keep from exploding himself. “Then what are you waiting for? Chances are your man is still in the hotel. Registered there. Why haven’t you instituted a room-to-room search? Checked all the people checking out—?”

  “Governor, please. Don’t tell me how to do my job. For one thing, we have no tangible proof it’s an inside job like you say, though I think so too, personally. For another, at last count, the Kahala Hilton is capable of accommodating about two thousand people if you fill up each available room. And it’s filled now, with all those tourists and fun-lovers in for the Hawaiian Regionals and the Hilo tournaments. Golf buffs, bridge buffs, swimming buffs and Mr. and Mrs. Joe Doakes from Prairie Acres, Wisconsin. Checking out? You ever check out of a hotel? There’s a dozen different ways of doing it. You can call down from your room and say get my bill ready. Or you can just walk out and leave your keys at the desk and pay up. Or you can do the crooked thing and skip. No, sir. We wouldn’t have a prayer. These killers were ready for anything. So I sidetracked them a little. No skin off their nose. Endore is still here. Still around. They have more time to take another shot at the job.”

  The Governor studied the face of the man he admired above all others in the Hawaiian complex.

  “Go on, Steve. What are you trying to say?”

  “Cards, Governor. Face up on the table. You know why Endore is here. You know why he’s hanging around instead of beating it to the mainland pronto.”

  “And?”

  “I’ve got two people in the hospital and another walking around with a bad knife wound. I’m a target too. The next one, obviously. I think I’ve earned my right to know what’s up. Wouldn’t you say?”

  “Do you have any more to say?”

  McGarrett straightened up from the desk. In his justifiable outburst, he had leaned over it, speaking directly to the Governor, reasonably well-controlled and polite.

  “Yes. Endore’s life is still up for grabs. We’ve stopped two of the men who were sent here to get him. With a reasonable guess, I’d say we can count on a few other hired killers being involved. You want me to save his hide, you tell me what he’s got that’s so all-fired crucial—then maybe I can do my proper job of protecting him.”

  “I see. Yes, that’s reasonable. You always are reasonable, McGarrett, even when you are at your unreasonable worst.” The Governor took a long moment, looked at the round little golden clock on his fancy desk and made a brushing motion with his hands.

  “All right. I’ll tell you now. Because sometime this afternoon, Rogers Endore should be on his way to the mainland. He has remained here because he has to pick up a package of great importance. He has to bring that package to the mainland. To Washington. It’s top secret, top priority and a load of T.N.T. in terms of security value.”

  “Goddammitt,” McGarrett heaved a sigh of vindication. “I knew it. Knew it all the way.” He sat down in the visitor’s chair across from the desk. “Go on. I won’t interrupt anymore.”

  “Don’t make promises you can’t keep, Steve.” The Governor smiled ruefully. “I think you can appreciate that I cannot give you names, places or specific dates. My governmental sources and contacts will have to remain a secret. Security—a word you can appreciate. But I can tell you the nature of things without, again I’m unable to, telling you directly all that it means. So, as briefly as possible, it poses like this. Mr. Rogers Endore left Gr
eat Britain to go to Washington, D.C. But he had to stop in Hawaii, first. The long way around, but there it is. And there it rests.”

  “Sorry to interrupt. Yesterday, at that TV studio, you said East Berlin.”

  “So I did. And that’s true, also. I was speaking figuratively. Endore came here from Berlin after leaving London. It has all to do with us. He picked up something there, I don’t know what, transported it here and now he sits waiting for the second half of his pickup. Again, I don’t know what. I only know it’s important. Very important. Something that concerns the mutual friendship of Britain and the United States. We’ve always been on the same side of the fence in world wars and world peace programs. So that’s it. I’m as curious about one thing as you are. Why does a country risk the life of a very famous diplomat in such a seemingly simple business as making him the receiver of say, coded information, or dangerous—contraband? I just don’t know. I doubt even if Endore knows the nature of what he has been asked by his country to deliver.”

  McGarrett pondered.

  “Best cover of them all, though. You wouldn’t expect Nixon to be asked to do the spy routine, would you?”

  “No, that part of it makes sense. But it flies in the face of Geneva Conventions and the like. Also, the cover has not worked, obviously. We’ve had our proof. Someone is trying to kill Endore. Trying to stop him from reaching Washington.”

  “Trying to acquire this valuable thing—whatever it is—too.”

  “Check. And doublecheck.” The Governor shrugged helplessly. “I for one will be glad when the parcel gets here and I can deliver it to Endore. After that, I shall heartily recommend that he get a move on.”

  “You’re delivering it?” McGarrett frowned. “What’s that mean?”

  “Yes. My Washington contact says it will arrive in this office around noon. Don’t look at me like that. I have no idea what it is. How small, how large. Whether it’s animal, vegetable or mineral. I’ll just know what it is by the code name and address on the outside of the parcel.”

  “Does Mr. Endore know you’re the middleman?”

  “No, he does not. He’ll probably fall through the floor when I confront him with my gift. I hope it’s a gift and not a Pandora’s box. I’m just as edgy as you are about these matters, Steve. I don’t like working in the dark anymore than you do.”

  “It’s ten o’clock now.” McGarrett got to his feet, rebuttoning his suit jacket. “Two hours. I’ve got things to do.” The Governor nodded. “You can reach me at the Kahala. Or Five-O.”

  “Fair enough,” the Governor said. “You won’t mention any of this to Endore?”

  “No, I will not. I’m too busy keeping an eye out for assassins. We haven’t seen the last of them yet. Not if they know about parcels and things. May be a hornet’s nest all day.”

  “Be careful.”

  “Thanks.”

  Neither man had anything else to say to the other. The Governor returned to a pile of documents on his desk that needed his immediate perusal and attention, and McGarrett left the office. The skies outside the office windows had darkened even more.

  When it rains in Hawaii, it can last for days. The Governor didn’t like the change in the weather. It boded no good, an omen of gloom. Things going badly. He shook the feeling off and got back to his desk work.

  The subject of Steve McGarrett was still in the back of his mind, though.

  A damn uncanny police officer in many ways.

  By all that was holy, where did the man get his unfailing, fantastically on-the-nose hunches?

  The Governor just didn’t know.

  Neither did McGarrett.

  Or any one else for that matter.

  Carraway stared almost accusingly at Rogers Endore’s back as the Briton put on a tropical worsted jacket and reset his cravat. The diplomat, tanned and still springy of movement and manner, was literally dwarfed by Carraway’s massive size.

  “Miss Endore will meet you downstairs in the breakfast room, sir.”

  “Good. Have to put on a real show for her to get her out of here and on a plane. Back me up, Carraway. That’s an order.”

  “Sure thing.” Carraway’s half-hearted tone made Rogers Endore fling a glance at him in the dresser mirror.

  “Don’t we sound down in the mouth this morning. What’s eating you, Leftenant Carraway?” It was the secretary’s old rank with the tank corps in Africa. He stiffened, recognizing the note of severity.

  “Well, sir—”

  “Yes, yes. What is it?”

  Carraway set his mouth in a grim line. The pocked side of his face, oddly enough, always made his face pleasantly homely.

  “Don’t you think, sir, meaning no offense, that we should tell Mr. McGarrett about Sidney Morley?”

  “You think we should?”

  “Yes, sir. I do indeed.”

  “I don’t. That’s all there is to it. We shall be off this island by tomorrow the latest. No point in mucking things up, is there?”

  “McGarrett is a fine officer. Know the type, sir. A great head on him. He could be a great help.”

  “I’ve no doubt of that—” Rogers Endore considered the point, then shrugged it off. “No, no. Out of the question right now. But I promise you, I’ll think about it.”

  “Thank you, sir.”

  “Now—wipe that gloom off your dear face—and let’s go down and try some of this famous papaya we’ve heard so much about. Though I confess I’d trade it all for some kippers and a rasher of bacon—”

  That was a feeling Carraway did agree with.

  About not telling McGarrett, he was of a different opinion.

  McGarrett drove back to Five-O Headquarters. Along the curving ribbon of highway which followed the natural lay of the terrain. To his right, the shoreline stretched out toward the ocean, with the tall palms and shrubbery bending with the morning winds. The troubled sky, even with a sun blazing down, was misting over rapidly. Rain was in the very air. Beds of dead lava rock and black sinkholes dotted the expanse of sand. In the ocean itself, light craft and fishing boats raced for port; the marinas and docks and piers that fairly riddled the coral of Oahu. The rising skyline of the city of Honolulu, with its modern hotels, apartment-house complexes and buildings still under construction, filled the horizon to the south.

  McGarrett was in a thoughtful mood, even as he drove. His mind reassessing the facts, juggling them, rearranging them until some order could be found. Some design from the chaos since yesterday, when the Governor had handed him the case.

  Disaster caught up with him at the next fork in the highway, where the lanes divided, going in four directions, the exits and entrances to Honolulu proper marked off in big white signs with black letters on them. Markers for newcomers and tourists.

  He didn’t hear the high whine of a bullet. Nor did he see the point from which the bullet had come.

  Suddenly, the wheel of the car spun in his hands as the rear right tire collapsed. The vehicle, his private sedan, and not a squad car, careened wildly. Smashing into a divider, it climbed it and jumped crazily into the adjoining lane—of oncoming traffic.

  In a mad, flashing second, the car roared out of control. Right into the path of a truck bearing a load of bananas and pineapples for one of the downtown marketplaces. Head-on.

  McGarrett heeled the wheel over, spinning out of the way, pumping the floor brakes to slow himself down before he rolled over the embankment on his left. A gradual, twenty-foot dip off the rising shoulder of highway. Not exactly a grassy, cushiony landing.

  The frightened face of the truck driver, slamming his brakes down to stop, was the last thing McGarrett remembered before the embankment caught up with him.

  Traffic horns were blaring, the rain was beginning to come down—there was a beat and thud of angry violence in the air.

  McGarrett’s sedan plunged off the embankment, thudded down the graded slope and burst into flame on impact.

  In fast, furious seconds, the fire blasted the engin
e and gas tank. There was a thunderous explosion which rained metal, fabric and rubber and plastic all over the surrounding terrain for a hundred yards. The sedan smoldered.

  What was left of it.

  Three hundred yards down the road, off the highway, on a shelf of rock overhung with dense foliage and shrubs, Mark Tillingham turned to Angelo Bellini and Von Litz, His face wore a crooked grin. The automatic pistol, rigged with a hand stock and telescopic sight, was still nestling against his right shoulder. Not far off, the car they had come in stood waiting under the trees, unable to be seen from the highway.

  “There’s an end to our part of the bargain,” Tillingham said lightly. “Let’s get back to Bygraves and claim our share.”

  Bellini dropped his looped steel wire into his side pocket.

  “Too messy your way. But as long as it worked.”

  Von Litz was satisfied.

  “So long as the result is the same. Come. Let’s get out of here before the spectators begin to gather.”

  “Maybe he jumped clear,” Bellini said.

  “Only in the flicks,” Tillingham said sarcastically. “Will you drive, Bellini? I’m bushed.”

  “Sure, old sport,” Angelo Bellini said mockingly. “For one hundred and sixty-odd gees, I’d drive you to Trafalgar Square and back. Try me.”

  They trooped toward the car. Silently, quickly. They got in. Big Von Litz took the back seat again.

  “Where is Bygraves now?” Von Litz asked quietly. He rolled one of his deadly pellets in his palm.

  “At the hotel,” Bellini rasped. “Where do you think? He’s taking his best shot at Endore. About time too.” Neither of them knew of the unsuccessful attempt of the night before.

  Sirens had begun to scream in high keen down the highway. Noise and activity and commotion. The tenor of catastrophe. The rain was coming down in earnest, now.

  “It’ll douse the fire,” Tillingham observed. Bellini started the car motor. “But a bit late, I fear.”

  Von Litz made an approving noise in his chest.

  “No skin off my nose.” Angelo Bellini laughed.